And on the next pitch darned if he didn’t let out another war whoop and take off again for second base. So there we were, back where we started, with Schaefer on first and me on third. However, it turned out that at that time there wasn’t any rule against a guy going from second back to first, if that’s the way he wanted to play baseball, so they had to let it stand. “The umpires were just as confused as everybody else. Everybody just stood there and watched Schaefer, with their mouths open, not knowing what the devil was going on.”Įven if the catcher had thrown to first, Jones said, he was too flabbergasted to move off third. He figured the catcher might throw to first–since he evidently wouldn’t throw to second–and then I would come home same as before.
“Well, on the next pitch Schaefer yelled, ‘Let’s try it again!’ And with a blood-curdling shout he took off like a wild Indian back to first base, and dove in headfirst in a cloud of dust. “So now we had men on second and third,” Jones recalled. However, the catcher, wise to the strategy, held onto the ball. Hoping to draw a throw that would allow Jones to race home with the go-ahead run, Schaefer stole second. Jones was perched on third base in the late stages of a tied ballgame. “They say it can’t be done,” Tigers outfielder Davy Jones told author Larry Ritter many years later, “but I saw him do it.” Schaefer first pulled off his signature stunt in a game against Cleveland, most likely in 1908 (the exact date is unclear). And, most famously, he occasionally stole first base. He tip-toed along the foul line like a tightrope walker and rowed across the outfield grass using bats as oars. On rainy days, he carried an umbrella onto the field, wore a raincoat and boots to the plate, or splashed barefoot in the puddles. To protest an umpire’s decision to keep a game going in fading light, he trotted out to his position with a lantern in hand. Nobody in the long history of baseball ever craved the spotlight more than Herman “Germany” Schaefer, for whom no gag was too outrageous or primitive and no audience too small or unfriendly. “For years after,” remembered one sportswriter in attendance, “Schaef used to dwell on how the career of a great thespian was ruined by such frivolous first-night criticism.” Amid the barrage of eggs, turnips, and tomatoes, two great shepherd’s hooks reached out from the wings and dragged the failed act off the stage. Rotten vegetables and cries of “Give ‘em the hook!” filled the air. The audience erupted over the stale joke. “Why,” Schaefer asked, “does Tyrus Cobb Tyrus (tire us)?” The skit had already produced several minutes of groans and catcalls when Schaefer invoked the name of Ty Cobb, the brilliant young star who had just helped lead the Tigers into their first World Series, a losing effort against the Chicago Cubs. The pair, dressed as leprechauns and dancing a jig, were making their vaudeville debut in front of a rowdy, liquored-up crowd on amateur night. On this winter evening in 1908, the zany ruddy-face second baseman of the Detroit Tigers was appearing at a burlesque house in Chicago with his lifelong pal and double-play partner, shortstop Charley O’Leary. There were few ballplayers who were as colorful as Tiger infielder Germany Schaefer.Īt the ballpark or away, Germany Schaefer was always putting on a show.